


Not in the stars to hold our destiny

by antonomasia09



Category: Quantum Leap
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon, Angst, Gen, Post-Canon, Sam Beckett Leaps Home
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-16
Updated: 2016-12-16
Packaged: 2018-09-08 11:59:32
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,065
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8844046
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/antonomasia09/pseuds/antonomasia09
Summary: Sam leaps home, but things can't go back to the way they were before.





	

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Blackbird Song (Blackbird_Song)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Blackbird_Song/gifts).



> Title comes from a misquote of Shakespeare's _Julius Caesar_ : "It is not in the stars to hold our destiny but in ourselves." This fic pretty much ignores the last scene of _Mirror Image_ , and assumes that Sam just leapt home instead (sorry). Happy Yuletide!

Al found Sam half-hidden in the shadows on the floor of Ziggy’s frigid server room, tinkering with some relays. He let out a puff of cigar smoke—partly to alert Sam to his presence, and partly to enjoy watching Sam frown with annoyance that Al was smoking near his delicate equipment.

“I’m kind of busy right now,” Sam said, but he tucked away the wires he’d been stripping. He was wearing only a light sweater over a t-shirt, and Al shivered a little just looking at him even though Sam didn't seem to be noticing the cold.

“Verbena said you’ve been down here pretty much since you got back,” Al said, casual. Sam picked up an electric wrench from the pile of tools beside him and started fiddling with its settings. “She thinks it’s because your brain is still swiss-cheesed and you’re looking for something familiar.”

Sam said nothing.

“You want to know what I think?”

“Not really.”

“I think you feel like you leapt into Sam Beckett’s life, and you keep wondering when you’re going to leap out of it again.” Sam looked up sharply, but Al didn’t dwell on the satisfaction of being right. He inhaled, letting the smoke fill his lungs. “This is it, Sam. You’re done. You’re home.”

For just a second, there was an expression of intense relief on Sam’s face at the words he’d been waiting years to hear, but it quickly dropped away and the scowl returned. “You don’t know that,” Sam protested. “This could just be another leap. Any minute, I could fix whatever it is I was sent here to do and then disappear.”

“Ziggy says the odds of that are 0.001%.”

“Yeah, well, Ziggy’s been known to be wrong before.” 

Al eyed the hard drive with its guts threatening to spill across the floor. “So you’re just going to hide down here, and what? Hope that you’re not meant to be augmenting Ziggy’s data restructuring capabilities?”

Sam dropped the wrench and leaned his head back against a rack of servers with a sigh. “Even if she’s right, I’m not sure what I _should_ be doing. I’ve spent so long being other people, living other people’s lives, fixing their problems. I don’t know how to just be Sam Beckett anymore.”

“Oh, being Sam is easy.” Al waved a hand. “All you have to do is invent whole new branches of mathematics and instantly memorize entire musicals and give me heart attacks when you run off and step into untested time machines without warning.”

Sam blushed. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I still don’t really remember why I did that.” He shivered and his hands retreated into his sleeves. Al shrugged off his silver bomber jacket and wordlessly handed it over to his friend.

“Thanks,” Sam said. “It’s just…as hard as some of those leaps were, I knew they weren’t going to last forever. There was something I was supposed to do, I’d either do it or not, and then I’d move on and start it all over again. But now I’m back, and all I can think about is this huge expanse of time in front of me. And I don’t know what to do with it.”

There was an obvious response to that, and it infuriated Al a little that Sam couldn't see it. "You think just because you’re not leaping around in time anymore that you can’t make a difference in the world? There are plenty of people here and now who could use your help.”

“Like who?”

“Like _me_.” Al bent over and grabbed Sam by the shoulders, willing him to understand. “I thought my best friend was lost in time forever. By some miracle he was sent back to me, but it feels like he’s only half-here, and I don’t know how to reach him.”

Sam shook his head. “It’s not the same.”

“Sure it is,” Al said. “Maybe God or Time or Fate or Whatever looked at me and saw how much I missed you—how much all of us on this project needed you—and then gave you back to us to fix it.” He let go of Sam’s shoulders and stepped back. “So that’s your mission for now, Sam: come out to dinner with me tonight, and tomorrow we’ll go to Los Alamos and buy you some new shirts because nobody’s going to take you seriously in anything without at least one blinking light on it.”

Sam laughed at that. “Like I’d take fashion advice from _you_.”

Al straightened the sunglasses clip on his shiny purple tie, ignoring the jibe. “And then we can go and visit your family in Indiana, and you can officially introduce me to your brother and sister.”

“Oh no, you’re not getting anywhere near my sister,” Sam interrupted.

Al grinned, and continued, “And then once you’re back to your happy-go-lucky self, you get to move on to the next thing. And that can be whatever you want. Revolutionizing another field of science. Joining the circus. Hell, you could start a school.”

Sam looked thoughtful at that. “That might not be a bad idea, actually.”

“Really? I was just kidding,” Al backpeddaled.

“No, I think you might be on to something. I mean, I’m just one person; there’s a limit to how much I can do. But if I can teach other people to be better, to help others, then they can go and teach even more people, like a chain reaction.” Sam paused. “Maybe that’s what I’m supposed to be doing here.”

“That sounds like the sort of thing that could take a long time to accomplish,” Al said cautiously. “A lifetime, even.”

Sam smiled up at him. “Yeah, it could,” he agreed. “And I could use the help of someone who’s good at persuading rich donors to give up their money and who already knows just about everything I could teach him.”

“Did you have someone in mind?” Al teased.

“Yeah, as a matter of fact, there’s this Admiral I know of,” Sam grinned.

Al would say yes. Of course he would. When had he ever been able to deny Sam anything?

“Come on, kid. Let’s get out of here.”

He held out a hand, and pulled Sam to his feet, then into a rough hug. “I’m glad you’re home,” he whispered into Sam’s hair.

“It’s good to be back,” Sam agreed.


End file.
